1982 Lada Niva

[GoceKU]

This is the little 4x4 that i've been fixing last few months ( almost a year). First thoughts buy it cheap and keep the repairs on the cheap, but it quickly turned in just trying to save it and dumping money in it to fix it right. Almost all the work was done by me lots of rust repair, structural and cosmetic. Lots of body work about 5 kg of plastic body filler most of it ended up on the floor, couple of cans of sprayable filler and a lot of sandpaper. The engine got some attention, the gearbox, transfer case and the diff got an oil change. I also did lot of suspension work, and protecting from rust. As an addition i did little improving, cooling system got an upgrade, transfer case got its own cage, secondary fuel LPG system, entire electrical system got an rework and up date. Now i'm at the end of the repairs, i'm finishing the last few things so i wanted to share the troubleshooting period and ownership on this thread.

 

[brino]

"watching" for updates and more pictures.
Thanks for sharing it!
-brino

 

[Martin W]

Great job
I have been following along
Cheers
Martin

 

[Winegrower]

Bravo, that was heroic!
You have an amazing range of talents.
Thanks for sharing the journey!

 

[GoceKU]

Today i spend couple of hours welding grinding making brackets to mount the seats in the little niva. The passenger side was prefited, but the drives seat i just welded the mounts symmetrical to the passenger side. And what do you know it the seats them self are not symmetrical so the drivers side was about 2" more to the middle of the car, so i'll have to cut the mounts and redo them tomorrow. I also decided i'll buy black seat covers so the seats will match the rest of the black interior.

 

[GoceKU]

Today i had the day off work so i spent half of the day in the garage, installing aftermarket wheel liners and mud flaps. The liners are pretty crudely made and very thick. I used selfdrilling big head short bolts with black anodized finish. I used many bolts about 220 pcs, installing them mean removing the wheels one by one and after attaching the wheel liner and mudflap, putting them back on.

 

[markba633csi]

I like the yellow color!

 

[GoceKU]

Yeah, i'm not a big fan of yellow but it is period correct and i've chosen this particular shade because in my opinion is the the best of all the yellows and is very close to the original that this little 4x4 come out of the factory with.

 

[rwm]

Just checking in. I cannot believe you built this car from scratch...don't deny it! Great work.
Robert

 

[Firstram]

Just checking in. I cannot believe you built this car from scratch...don't deny it! Great work.
Robert

With junkyard parts too! Looks fantastic, love the yellow.